The Arkansaw traveler., 1887-12-31
BULL FIGHTING IN MEXICO.
BY ALEX. SWEET.

BY ALEX. SWEET.
 It is announced in some newspapers of western Texas that the annual bull fights at Laredo, Monterey, and other Mexican cities, in honor of the Virgin of Guadeloupe, will be more numer- ously attended than ever. This is the season of the year when the Mexicans on the Rio Grande improve their minds with .festas. The conspicuous features of the .festa are drunkenness, gambling and bull-fighting, but occa- sionally the lower order of Mexicans fight among themselves with knives and fatal results. This may be re- garded as redeeming feature.
 Another redeeming feature is that while the festa is going on the Mexi- cans have not any time to waste in robbing Texas ranches of their stock. Nobody can gamble, get drunk, go to bull fights and steal ponies at one and the same time. At Laredo and Fl Paso, owing to the completion of railroads to these points, the Mexicans have re- ceived considerable assistance from 8 certain class of Americans in properly celebrating the fiesta. There are not as many Americans as Mexicans, but they help to make it a success. They are very willing. It takes five or six Mexicans to get drunk and make as much fuss as one hardy Anglo-Saxon. The latter throws more soul into the performance. He can be heard several miles of, thanks to the impulsive vo- ciferousness of the American.
 The greatest attraction about the Mexican festa is the bull-fght, so called. The bull-fght takes place in an amphitheatre built for the pur- pose. It will hold great many peo- pie, probably as many as can get into it. The bull-fghters are dressed in all the colors of the rainbow. They look very much like the faces on play ing cards. It is really amusing to see the jack of diamonds, the king of hearts, and all the rest of the royal family that are so familiar to many of us, prancing about the arena.
 In most cases there is no bull-fight at all, unless butchery can be called a fight. There is more real danger in lighting kerosene lamp, or in calling a policeman 8 liar, than there is in a dozen bull flights. Before the bull is turned into the arena several inches of his horns are sawed off. AS with some folks know, it hurts the bull to have it's horns cut off. If heroic bull fighter should lose his presence of mind, and in his efforts to get out of the arena run against the bull, dull horn is the kind of horn the reckless daredevil wants to run against but there is no danger of that. The horns are sawed off down to the quick, and are actually bloody. The end of the horn is as sensitive to the bull as an army sized boil is to man. If man has large sized boil on his person he does not try to butt people with it. On the contrary he is very careful that nobody hits against it. That's the way it is with the bull and his sore horns. Instead of rushing about try ing to impa.e the bull fighter, the bull is scared half to death for fear that some of his tormenters may actually bump against that sore horn, and he tries to evade them as much as possi- ble.
 As soon as the bull refuses to hurt his sore horn against the reckless mat adors, the air is rent with ciUds of the audience in honor of the reckless in- trepidity of the bull-fghter, who gracefully bows his acknowledge ments. All the bull-fighters attempt to bump against that sore horn, but the bull is too smart for them. They punch him with spears, thrust sharp spikes, festooned with tissue paper. in his hide, until he is dripping with blood. When the unfortunate brute is exhausted he is finally lassoed, the spikes are pulled out of his hide, and he is driven out of the arena or butch cred.
 The Mexican bull-f fight is beauti- ful blending Of Spanish cruelty and Indian cowardice. No decent Ameri- can would sit through the whole per- formance, even if he were paid for it. If he really needed an emetic he would go to a drug store and get one, although it could not possibly be as nauseating as the scenes in the arena.
 Rosy hues and rounded cheeks may l. A- | .